Defense Ministry to request record-high 6 trillion yen budget for next fiscal year

August 23, 2015

The Defense Ministry will request a record-high defense budget of 5.9 trillion yen for fiscal year 2016, government officials on August 22 announced.

Stressing the need to cope with “the threat from China”, the ministry in this budget request seeks to purchase twelve Osprey aircraft at a cost of 132.1 billion yen.

The ministry, however, stopped short of including in the request the cost related to a plan to deploy Ospreys to the Saga Airport in Saga Prefecture as it has yet to obtain consent from the Saga governor.

In the budget plan, as part of measures to strengthen defense capabilities in the Southwest Islands, the ministry will spend 19.4 billion yen to deploy security squads to Amami Oshima Island (Kagoshima Prefecture) and Miyako Island (Okinawa Prefecture). The ministry also plans to use 103.5 billion yen to buy six F35s, the next-generation fighters, and 167.5 billion yen for constructing an Aegis destroyer, which will play a key role in defense against ballistic missile attacks.

The defense authority argues that 307.8 billion yen, the same amount as the previous year, should be allocated for the realignment of U.S. forces in Japan, including the planned relocation of the Futenma base from Ginowan City to Nago City within Okinawa.

The ministry will also request funding for designing a surveillance system to strengthen Japan-U.S. military cooperation in space.